2 probed for 2007 businessmen case (3)

(ANSA) - Palermo, July 1 - Two people were placed under investigation Friday for the disappearance on August 3, 2007 of father-and-son Palermo businessmen Antonio and Stefano Maiorana, judicial sources said. Notices of investigation were served on noted Palermo construction boss Francesco Paolo Alamia and another businessman, Giuseppe Di Maggio.
    In January the inquiry into the mysterious disappearance of the Maioranas made a breakthrough as excavations disclosed a shoe and bag stained red.
    The shoe and the bag were found in a layer of building material in searches that began after the inquiry was re-opened due to new witness evidence.
    The two vanished after leaving a construction site on the Isola delle Femmine in Palermo province where they were building houses.
    They said goodbye to workers and left personal effects in their offices at the site, suggesting they intended to return shortly.
    Their Smart car was found in a car park at Palermo airport but it emerged that the two men never took a flight from the facility.
    Since 2007 investigators have worked on various theories including a possible Mafia connection or a dispute at their work project and false sightings of the two were reported in Barcelona.
    The prosecutor's office recommended shelving the case but a judge ordered Carabinieri police to use georadar to search a vast area where Antonio Maiorana's cellphone was tracked to having been a short time before he disappeared.
    That second probe also was shelved until the investigation was re-opened again in 2015 due to tips to investigators.